Krishna Bhagavathula

As Chief Technology Officer and Executive Vice President for the NBA, Krishna Bhagavathula is responsible for setting the NBA’s technology strategy and ensuring alignment with the league’s objectives.  He leads teams that deliver best-in-class applications, systems/cloud infrastructure, courtside technology, and workplace experiences that support the NBA’s leagues, staff and teams.

Since joining the NBA in 2017, Bhagavathula and his team have executed significant digital transformations.  These include several cutting-edge technology initiatives that have impacted management of high-speed arena and global networks, cloud-based enterprise infrastructure, fan-facing systems that deliver content, data engineering teams and self-service workflows through automation.

Prior to joining the NBA, Bhagavathula served as Chief Technology Officer for NBC News Digital, where he oversaw technology teams focused on developing web, mobile and OTT platforms and products for NBCNews.com, MSNBC and shows including TODAY, Nightly News and Meet The Press.  Before joining NBC News in 2013, he spent more than eight years at WebMD, most recently as Vice President of Engineering, where he led development teams responsible for WebMD’s Internet properties, mobile applications, content management and search/discovery platforms.

Bhagavathula has also held management consulting positions with BearingPoint, IBM and PricewaterhouseCoopers after starting his career as a software engineer developing mobile network provisioning systems.  He has extensive experience driving strategic and transformational digital initiatives that have deep organizational impact, as well as delivering business and technology solutions across a wide range of companies ranging from startups to multi-billion-dollar corporations.

A frequent speaker and panelist at industry conferences and events, Bhagavathula serves on the advisory boards of several CTO/CIO consortiums and executive committees.  He has a master’s degree in mechanical engineering and lives in Princeton, N.J., with his wife and two daughters.